Welcome to the K7FED Cross Band Repeater System
IRLP Node 3319 and EchoLink Node 6778

Located in the S.E. corner of Henderson, NV near Greenway and US95.

Output Freq / Input Freq
145.420MHz / 144.820MHz
447.675MHz / 442.675MHz

100hz CTCSS

Currently the node is a ground level station transmitting at 145.420 MHz with a -600khz offset and linked to 447.675MHz with a -5mhz offset. The 2m and 440 repeaters are linked full time. It is intended to improve coverage in the far SE corner of the Henderson / Eastern Las Vegas Metropolitan area. Eventually I will look to relocating the repeater to a location with better coverage. As of 5/19/2007 the node is now capable of both EchoLink and IRLP connections using the Echo-IRLP scripts.

To check the node connection status on the air just send " 00 " from your DTMF pad.

The activity log for node 3319 can be found here.

Real time repeater and link status monitoring can be found here.

The is repeater constructed with these toys listed from rack top to bottom:

1. AC transient suppression power strips.
2. Sinclair RM201-108S1B RX multicoupler shelf acting as a VHF receive preamp inserting about 23dB of gain and additional bandpass filtering.
3. CAT WX-200 to monitor NWS and local civil emergency authorities for EAS alerts and relay them to the repeater. During EAS events there is a voice announcement every 30 minutes stating the nature of the event in progress.
4. Arcom RC-810 8 port Repeater Controller.
5. SpectraCom 8183 NetClock/GPS providing 10MHz reference to the VHF Quantar and NTP time synchronization to my internal computer network.
6. LCD Monitor.
7. APC Smart UPS 1400. Provides some backup power to the rack and transient suppression.
8. P4 1Ghz Computer with 512mb RAM and 40gb hard disk running Fedora Linux core and Echo-IRLP software connected full time to the internet via 10mb/1.5mb pipe.
9. HP 1RU keyboard shelf unit.
10. Kenwood TKR850 repeater @ 40 watts into a 6 cavity compact duplexer you cannot see sitting on top of it.
11. Motorola Quantar (VHF Range1, 125 watt, P25 digital capable) running in wideband analog only mode(+/-5KHz / 25Khz Channel Spacing) @ 50 watts output to the TelWave TPRD-1556 6 cavity BpBr duplexer to the right of the rack. I may add mixed digital/analog operation at some time in the future if I can acquire a DIU for the interface. TX 145.420MHz / RX 144.820MHz. PL 100.0hz.

Off Picture components include:

• 12vdc 20AH battery for power to 12vdc devices.
• DCI-146-4H VHF Bandpass filter in the VHF receiver path to act as an additional pre-selector for interference reduction.
• Dual Stage Isolators inline with both the UHF and VHF transmitters for IM reduction.
• UHF/VHF Diplexer to combine both repeaters into one antenna.
• 100ft Times Microwave LMR-400 cable for antenna feed line.
• Diamond X700HNA 9dBd VHF / 13dBd UHF dual band colinear vertical antenna with the base at 25ft AGL.

What is this repeater trying to tell me? courtesy tones and such...

The controller is configured with 4 ports. The controller beeps the port number.  (Currently the courtesy tone beep codes are not working)

The ports are:

1. The VHF repeater receiver.
2. The UHF Repeater
3. The Emergency Alert System Decoder.
4. The Echo-IRLP Node Computer.

So, if you hear 1 beep it is the repeater receiver on port one un-keying, 2 beeps is the Echo-IRLP node un-keying, 3 beeps is the EAS decoder un-keying. 4 beeps is the UHF receiver unkeying. (Currently the courtesy tone beep codes are not working) 

DTMF Control Codes and such...

There are a few public control codes for the system. Here is a list for your awareness:

• *02 - Speaks the current time and date that the controller thinks it is.
•   00 - Speaks the current node connection status.
•   73 - Disconnects any EchoLink or IRLP connection in progress.
• *411 - Speaks the last node connection information.

IRLP Connections:

• To Connect send the 4 digit number of the IRLP node you wish to connect to. ( for example 9250 connects to the Western Reflector channel 0 )
• To disconnect from the currently connected IRLP node send 73. 

EchoLink Connections:

• To connect to an EchoLink node prefix the node number with ** (i.e. **340515 ).
• To disconnect from EchoLink send 73.

Basic operational guidelines for IRLP

COMMON MODES
There are two connection modes for an IRLP connection.  Direct one-to-one or, one-to-many via a Reflector.

Direct connect is just like it sounds where repeater (node) "A" connects direct with node "B".  With this type of link the two nodes are interconnected and no other IRLP connections are possible.  While repeaters "A" and "B" are connected, anyone attempting to connect with either node will be told by a  recording that - "The node you are calling is currently connected to callsign" however all local traffic on each repeater will be heard on the other repeater as well.

While Direct Connect is preferred for a city to city chat, another type of  connection in use today is via the Western Reflector ( Ref 9250 ).  A reflector is a computer that is not connected to any radio but rather sits on lots of internet bandwidth capable of allowing many repeaters to be inter-connected together by streaming the received audio back to all other connected stations.  At any given time there are usually 10 to 20 repeaters around the world interconnected via this Reflector.   You can always check which stations are connected to the reflector by visiting http://status.irlp.net and looking for nodes connected to individual nodes or reflectors.

REFLECTOR USE
With reflector use the first thing we must all remember is to leave a gap between transmissions.  Having said that this is a good time to list the three main rules when connected to a reflector:

Pause

Pause

Pause

Due to the slight increase in delays created by multiple Tone Squelch radios in the links between the repeater and IRLP link radio, a slight change in our normal operating procedures is required with IRLP. 

By leaving a pause between transmissions it ..... 

allows users on other nodes a chance to check in.

allows other nodes time to send touch-tone commands to drop their node.

The most important guideline to remember is leaving a pause after pressing the PTT button as well as between transmissions

Please visit my affiliate group and the proud owners/operators of the western reflector 9250, 

NEVADA AMATEUR RADIO REPEATERS, INC.

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Email me at andy@technerd.net

This page last updated Thursday, November 08, 2007 04:27 PM